>> if everyone could please take their seats. welcome back.

i am the chairperson of the board of the abraham lincoln institute. the curator of the abraham lincoln papers at the library of congress. a president of the united states traveled by train from washington dc to gettysburg to visit the battlefield and dedicate hallowed ground. speaking before an audience that included veterans, the president addressed the challenges the nation then faced and the need to preserve a government of the people. 1938 not 1863. the veterans were 75 years older. the president was fdr not abraham lincoln. the new york herald tribune reprinted that the speech under the headline roosevelt's gettysburg address. the chicago tribune proclaimed roosevelt anza lincoln armor. is -- it's seldom helps to wonder how a statement of one

generation would surmount the crisis of another. a statesman deals with difficulties with things that must be done from day to day. not often can he frame conchas patterns for the far-off future fdr acknowledged in his remarks. the stature of lincoln's nature and the usdamental conflict invite to turn to him for help. it is such invocations of the civil war past and a new deal era context that nina silver examines in her new book. silver introduces a the civil warto memory and explores how americans reinterpreted the civil war to meet their own needs during the great depression and world war ii. since completing her training as berkeley,n at uc

professor silver has returned to the fertile field of civil war studies to uncover new perspectives with which to engage civil war history. she has documented the gender dimensions of the war and daughters of the union. reunion, shee of traced the ships and normed -- northern sentiment toward the south during the. of reconciliation. and of the casualties of that reunion. in addition to her publications, she has further understanding of the civil war era through her career athed teaching boston university and her contributions to public history projects. to her ability to inspire and inform. having long benefited from the

insights of contained in her academic scholarship, i read an interview in which she was asked if she collected historical artifacts. as a result for the first time learned of the existence of civil war nurse barbie. [laughter] did you know that barbie was a nurse a gettysburg? although given her physical personality,erky and fondness for accessories, i'm guessing that barbie did not serve on the staff. she is still waiting for the barbie dream ambulance. those understood all of jokes, clearly this morning over for you either. [laughter] here to share with us how new deal era americans reshaped the legacy of abraham lincoln, please welcome nina silver. [applause]

>> thank you. barbie met lincoln in that book. at least there was a picture. thank you for that kind introduction. i am honored to be here in this setting. i have never been on the stage at ford's theater before. to johnply grateful white and the lincoln institute for the kind invitation to be here. i can tell you a little bit more about me. i am a scholar who studies the history of the american civil war. use andtudy how we sometimes heavily we misuse the history of the civil war. i am interested in how people have appropriated the war. have a reinterpreted it over time area often they do that in a way so that it speaks to their present-day concerns.

they manipulate the history to speak to the present. anybody who hasn't been under a the past few years knows something about how the civil war continues to get the appropriated and reinterpreted in the present day. recent clash and encounter over confederate monuments, civil war history continues to be retold with present-day concerns in mind. happened inmilar the 1930's. it wasn't so much monuments because people weren't holding monuments in the 1930's. the 30's were a decade of crisis end of people that some people thought had a lot of similarities to the 18th these. no historical figure came in for more reimagining or reinterpreting during the 1930's than abraham lincoln. prepared, this is not going to be me talking about lincoln

in the 19th century that it is going to be me talking about how lincoln was imagined in the 20th century. during the depression decade, lincoln was everywhere. movies were made about him asluding one by dw griffith well as the two better known lincoln movies, young mr. lincoln in 1939 with henry fonda. a lincoln in illinois with raymond massey. in the 1935 film the littlest rebel, lincoln meets with the petite confederate sympathizer played by shirley temple. she met lincoln also. the two of them shared an apple and then lincoln frees her father who was falsely confused confused with a confederate spy.

place --e two popular plays. stable inery popular the theater. in one of these, he was reincarnated as a kentucky college professor who helps to resolve a labor dispute. [laughter] lincolnead a lot of screenplays and scripts and that is one of the stranger interpretations of lincoln that i have come across. he was also frequently in the thick of 1930's politics often scrutinized and celebrated. power went beyond political symbolism. he also struck a deep emotional accord with american in these years. knownandburg wrote a well multivolume biography of the

president over the 1920's and 1930's. he probably did more than anyone to give lincoln and emotional have to. of swedish immigrant parents who had settled on the illinois prairie, and berg seemed attached to the notion that working people will and perhaps immigrants saw something in lincoln that made democracy viable and accessible. sandburg used the documentary in thehat became popular 30's and was similar to the style that was employed by only sandburg applied this to lincoln. surrounding him in a collage of historical details and allowing him to emerge seamlessly with of thoughts and dealings ordinary americans. that connection to ordinary people very much suited the mentality of the 30's because it was a moment when people tended andlame elite bankers

politicians. they said those were the ones responsible for creating the current economic crisis. they tended to believe or wanted to believe that the wisdom of the plane people what help american democracy survive. sandburg's work was on the mind of literary critic when he remarked that americans have developed a passionate addiction to lincoln. in 1942, after having written lincoln columns and completing portraits, the painter marston hardly stronger language when he said i am simply dead in love with that man. before the depression, lincoln did not radiate that kind of attachment or passion. there were not these kind of

declarations of heartfelt love for abraham lincoln. some wise, he didn't even radiate the same . . . . . . . moderation and reconciliation. he was described by william reflecting the brotherly love between north and south. in 1930 with economic collapse looming, president hoover hailed lincoln not as a great emancipator but a great moderator. poured their blessings of restraint his words poured their blessings of restraint on each sub squeent vennuation. in that same year dw grit it

used him as the subject for his first talking film. said he was d by carl sandburg and wanted to incorporate his work in what he was doing. he even tried to hire carl sandburg to be a consultant on his film but it turned out the sandburg was too expensive. i think he found someone else. lincolness, griffiths has nothing of the sandburg lincoln about it. he is a bland and monotonous figure in the film. he is your standard issue person. as one reviewer explained, lincoln made a notable attempt to be fair to the two has of our nation. abrahamot of the lincoln's who were betrayed in this earlier. or before class and had been aiting, lincoln was also

crude frontiersman. in one scene, the president flops down on the white house floor to take a nap. neutral,very bland, and fatigue lincoln who was portrayed. i think that image of lincoln in this. reflected the reluctance on the part of many white americans to the president with substantial power. precisely because lincoln in these years had to be safe. he had to be moderate and someone who could heal the ones of sectional division. in this way, lincoln was being called on to play a part that he had been playing since the end of the 19th century when the story of the civil war was often told as a tale of for journal division that gateway to brotherly reunification.

that was an idea that was most vividly imagined in the idea of white soldiers from opposing sides shaking hands across a bloody chasm or across the stone -- gettysburgburg angle. the idea of reconciliation seemed to be about to more or less equal sections coming together. not really about a nation or about lincoln and posing power on its subjects. especially those who came from a rebellious section of the country. had lincoln been imagined as he really was, as a figure of federal authority forced seceded states into the political submissions, he would have complicated that feel good reconciliation narrative. to keep things balanced, lincoln took a backseat to the emotional bonding of north and south. this is the kind of image of lincoln that you get in dw

motion pictureer birth of a nation. there are a lot of things that are odd about that film but there are things odd about the way lincoln is portrayed in that film. i would describe the lincoln in asth of a naked -- nation oddly androgynous. he is weepy, he wears a shawl, he serves as both father and mother figure to the american people. lincolnnd, it is not who helps to give birth to the nation in the film. but the consolidated power of white men north and south especially the ku klux klan. weakimage of a relatively lincoln presidency may also be one reason why the story of lincoln's youth, his frontier upbringing and awkward but

romantic encounters and mediocre , these stories became so captivating in the early 20th century because here was territory that can be mined for engaging human material without having to venture into the messy business of lincoln as a figure of power who actually enacted measures that did not meet with universal acclaim. 30's, lincoln looks different area and he is not a bland rigor of moderation. a mores to foreshadow powerful nationstate that was extending the blessings of freedom to a wider group of americans. being consciously reworked by writers and politicians, lincoln became a forerunner for the groundbreaking work of fdr's new deal.

helped, carl sandburg usher in this new lincoln when he compared fdr's national recovery program and its assistance for industrial workers to lincoln's role in emancipation. both presidents used their position to proclaim a new status for an oppressed people. fdrng a cue from sandburg, also made a link in for initiating social reform to expand executive power. simply heal the rift but transcended sectionalism and brought new to assure aeaning government the promotion of life liberty and happiness of all the people. lincoln as a 19th century version of himself.

no longer just a healer and reconciler, lincoln became aligned with the centralizing and reforming efforts of new deal liberalism. suggested, also had the new deal lincoln was also more of a great emancipator been a great moderator. it is true academics and had calleds attention to this aspect of lincoln's presidency but the work of freeing the slaves came even more to the forefront during the 1930's and the new deal. writers and artists and politicians imagined lincoln not unlike the way fdr imagined himself as someone who channeled a new political energy to make people's lives better. they said strengthen the hand of the federal government in order to attend to people's distress. a distress that was once marked by 19 century slavery but could

just as easily be marked by a 20th century economic crisis. ordinary people often use this language in letters that they wrote to roosevelt. freed thencoln slaves. and now you are about to free the child and wage slaves. this was language that was used frequently. people wrote lots of letters to fdr and members of the administration. they often made these comparisons. they used the language of slavery. they would draw out the idea that someone like roosevelt was needed to free the slaves. it wasn't quite so simple to talk about both presidents freeing the slaves since one president, lincoln, and had directed his actions toward enslaved black men and women.

supportersnd his were more reluctant about being associated with a racially defined agenda. president of the early 20th century who needed the support of powerful white southerners and his power -- party, roosevelt preferred keeping racial issues on the back burner and showed little interest in upsetting the racial status quo in the jim crow south. feeling the political pressure of white southerners, roosevelt refused to give his support to the federal antilynching law emerged by some members of congress. he also referred to think about lincoln in a race neutral way. as someone who practiced a broad-based humanitarianism that helped all people. lincoln, fdr insisted, was an emancipator not of slaves alone but of those of heavy heart everywhere.

sure this is not have people in the 1860's would have interpreted the emancipation. [laughter] they worked hard to redefine slavery as a condition that affected white people as much as black. sometimes in fact whites seemed to suffer more from slavery than african-americans. the 1930's was mainly about the economic thattation and constraint largely affected wage workers, the majority of whom were white area despite the fact that all of our people are free and have the right to live enforce the they please, there are many who intend that our toilers live virtual economic slavery. the assumptions here that everyone could live and work where they please, something that was not available to

african-americans, suggested that they were not really thinking about african-americans in this definition of virtual economic slavery. according to a representative of pennsylvania, lincoln's hatred of according to frank dorsey, lincoln's hatred would have extended into his distaste for "the new slavery that placed men in economic peonage." this quality made lincoln a "new dealer" of the late 1860s. so i think in the 1930s, lincoln was freeing white people and not black. it seemed to rest in the souls

of member. in a future play, a reincarnated lincoln -- i mentioned this before, a reincarnated lincoln comes to help white coal minors fight their own kind of slavery. they hold a sign that says "free the whites" an objective that appeals to lincoln. in sherlie temple he is there to free her father. if owe know the premise of "young mr. lincoln." you will remember they have virtually no contact with black characters. his real work involvements helping two white brothers falsely accused of murder.

in the most dramatic moment of the film, the two brothers face the wrath of an angry lynch mob, and he turns back the mob and mounts a successful defense from the brothers. and glet a very halting and ses tant sort of way, some new dealers know that race kept them down in the 1930s and the 1960s. lincoln's attention to racial -- when marianne anderson is banned from performing at the daughter's of the revolution concert hall, many figures including eleanor roosevelt helped to arrange his new open air concert in front of the

lincoln memorial. in refruiting the narrow prejudice, thaw lauded lincoln's role in striking the chains of slavery from marianneanderson's ancestors. it is april, 1949, by this time roosevelt and his associates understood that nazi violence was in the service of an abhorant racial agenda. oscar chopmapman pointed out th

difference. in washington, we have a shrine for abraham lincoln. so in this more explicit work, he was poised to assume a particularly prominent role as the 1940s began and a new role against fascism appeared. he figured as the subject of "lincoln por grant." he assumed greater prom nans in fdrs speeches that were not surprising because he hired the lincoln dramatist as a speech writer. the novelest robert penn warren said it was the civil war, not the revolution, that was used

most often in world war ii propaganda and the image, this is also warren speaking, and the image of lincoln, not that of washington or jefferson that flashed on the silver screen. the powerful associations that connected lincoln to fighting slavery helped turn him into the symbol that warren hemmed. it suggested that lincoln came to embodiy a certain type of moral energy in a new global conflict. at that moment, americans needed that kind of motivation. as late at 1940-41 there were people that remained cynical about the devastation of world

war i, and so in this context, timely reminders about lincoln and his commitment to emancipation helped people remember a moment when a true moral purpose guided americans war objectives. there is a literary scholar and i'm borrowing from the literary scholar, and they talk about the way that lincoln is used in the lead up to world war ii. and what he recalls is that americans might find a model of inspiration for fighting hitler. writers and partiartists refer m and his slavery as a metaphor for understanding the fight

against hitler and fascism. they say this world cannot exist half slave and half free. william white agreed that our great round earth had become a neighborhood that cannot live half slave and half free. not only were lincoln's words used, but he was a figure with fighting slavery. robert sherwood held up lincoln as a way to get off of the sidelines when certain principals were at stake. sherwood recognized the 16th president as a supreme nonisolationist in his essential faith. this made him an ideal figure for convincing americans that

despite their skepticism they should commit themselves a new to this foreign entanglement. significantly it presented african-american activists and artists with new activities. the more it was used in war-time propaganda, the more it gave americans a chance to remind their fellow americans that slavery was not just a metaphor, the slavery of the factory, the slavery striking coal miners, but also a historically significant experience that continues to impact black life in the united states. they urged a consistent antislavery message. both abroad and at home. as one writer for the chicago

defender put it, if he cared about fighting slavery, he wound stand by the amendments and make sure that negros were not returns. failing to do so would be no different than enacting laws similar to hitler's declarations. as always, hollywood did their part to distort this political environment. he appears frequently on screen. in subtle ways too, the movies in the late 1930s or 40s acknowledged that americans were under taking a fight against slavery. so i would like to conclude my talk by revisiting an old and familiar film. perhaps one of the most iconic in hollywood. it is not usually what we think

about. the film that i have in mid is casa blanca. it appeared in 1942, arriving in the united states in 1926, he embarked on a steady stream of movie making directing classics. the santa fe trail and atlanta city. the santa fe trail, the most poorly named movie that had nothing to do with santa fe or a trail. joining forces of a fanatical john brown played by raymen

massy. they also celebrate the coming together of white soldiers across sectional lines in a common cause. in this case it was union and confederate causes. it is also a film about reconciliation. it is about however bringing together the indifferent and skeptical rick blaine and victor laslow. a unity that is achieved when rick discards his cynicism and recognizes a chance to take a stand against nazi -- they

remind her about the last time they saw each other. i remember every detail, he says, the germans wore gray, you wore blue. okay, it tells us who is directing freedom and who is not. but the central theme was not a simple divide between freedom and slavery and this evolution from indifference to commitment. and in this case it is the process by which rick dedicates himself to the antimf nazi cause. how it became necessary to break with the isolationism of the

interwar period and accept the need again to fight this new war. there is a new over lay that the new fight is about principals, not about material gain i'm not going try and convince you that he shows up in casablanca. how does rick respond? in the language of abraham lincoln. i don't buy or sell human

beings. and this line perhaps more than any other reveals the ethical underpinning that signals ricks transformation. his willingness to take a stand. i think it is no accident that he uses the same anti-savory language in fact, it is very likely that the author of the antislavery pronouncement was howard koch. so even though lincoln himself does not as robert warren said. it embodies the lincoln like moral urgency that gets americans behind this effort. so this, then, this lincoln was once again, or at least his

spirit, was once again being reimagined, reinterpreted. this may have been a link kahn to inspire a more passionate lincoln. he would have an impressive career in world war two and even after in the cold war that followed. this was a lincoln who not only fought savely at home. however it might be defined on a global scale. thank you. >> man, love your reference to the imagery. imagery and messages are everything.

media, i'm reading now you mentioned the whiter, the defender. dealing with their own sense of identity who it is wraen it is going in that time period. . they also elected the confederate monuments. there is a dicotomy. where was this at the time, in the late 1800s to early 1900s where looking now at the international influence and impact where they have to come to brips with more.

you want to be anceler, can you give a little -- >> yeah, absolutely. >> use the mic. >> then i can't see again, though. there is not a lot of monuments built in the 1930s, a lot of them were early ier there is a competing narrative to all of the stuff i described about lincoln. think no further than gone with the wind. let's celebrate the south and the lost cause. it is a moment when you can see the two ways of thinking about the civil war. that is a pro lincoln point of view. more clearly in contention with one another. there is clear lines being dr n

drawn, definite differences. so that is a very interesting thing going on in the 1930s and the 1940s. the point about the international situation is definitely true. trying to understand for roosevelt to understand how he fit into the this whole new world dynamic and trying to establish american prestige, it almost necessitated the problem of savely and racial oppression. they were making that world is clear and prom naninent. by suggesting that yes, there is a history of racial oppression from the united states, and then

there is lincoln, as oscar chapman said we have a shrine for abraham lincoln. then there is the possibility of combatting that in racial history. >> in your talk i heard the words father, healer, shrine. for a time i thought about lincoln being assassinated on good friday. does the attention to lincoln become nearly religious and what who you think about that? >> there is a way that young mr.

lincoln lives on a super natural -- i think he always had those associations, but i don't find the familiar images, they are strongly religious, and i would almost stay overly secularized is the kind of lincoln you g in the '30s and '40s. that might be different from the lincoln in the 1880s and the 1890s, but because he is so often references, i don't feel

that the religious part comes out as strongly in this period. >> hi, professor. i loved hearing you refer to robert penn warren. i got to interview him in 1977 as an undergraduate. you mentioned erin copeman. why not mention richard hos hostedder. he is known for that dreadful chapter he wrote on lincoln. and did you know in 1946 all of but one of faulkner's novels went out of print because stalin disapproved of them. where is stalin in your account of the '30s and '40s.

>> i'm not sure where to put him, i guess. >> he is there, he didn't want phillip randolph far muching on washington, and the protest didn't occur because fdr created the fair employment practices commission, but she there. >> okay,ly think about that. thank you. >> when did lincoln go all of the countries. when did lincoln's name begin to be used in many different places? >> so my impression is that you

can find clubs, that is all happening immediately after the assassination. my sense is that monuments and statues are later, so maybe the 1880s, and the 1890s, and then of course the lincoln memorial for 1922. so there is -- my remarks here are not to say that he is being ignored. she being recognized and he is being honored and celebrated, but i do think there is a switch from less terms about lincoln. not a figure that represents the most consolidated power of the

american government. i don't think you had that image earlier, but i think you have that in the 1930s. >> there is an even more subtle if not oblique message in casa blanca. that was the lincoln brigade. i mentioned that because it is mentioned three times. i just thought me and the lincoln brigade. so you can wonder if that is subliminal. people would have known that reference at the time. >> right,ly go back and look at that, thank you. >> two questions if i can

remember them both, they're related. did any of the southern segregationist democratic po politicians say wait, you're using lincoln here as a symbol and after the war this will cause us a lot of trouble because all of these black soldiers are coming back home -- >> yeah, what about us now. secondly, the southern voters were solidly for fdr. he was a god in alabama and georgia. do you think he he over estimated even the smallest steps to improve civil rights? i think just to answer the second part first, but right, i think that roosevelt was very conscious of not alienating the

southern part of the democratic wing. and that informed his decision about the antilynching bill. and i think they were not a lot of attention. so roosevelt goes on a campaign to encourage more liberal white politicians in the south to challenge the conservatives, and you know people like margaret mitchell, for example, come down like the wrath of god on fdr at that point saying this is just like reconstruction all over again when the federal government tried to interfere with what we were doing and it was a very tense relationship. and i think the question is complicated. i think it was not so easy to

simply dismiss lincoln in the 1930s. you can say he was a tyrant and all of this, but there were people that still did that, and i think if anything what southern democrats tried to do was not talk about lincoln. so for example, one thing that i found interesting was douglas freeman, the biographer of robert e lee, he spends a lot of time trying to turn robert e lee, and he talks about his military strategy and other ideas and plans, and he tries to elevate him, but even douglas freeman says "lee is an important symbol, but so is ab ra hamm lincoln. it was so much that even someone like doug last freeman had to acknowledge that yes, at this

moment it feels more relevant. >> fdr being overly cautious, it was the same in those states, people might vote for segregationist congressmen, senators, and governors, but they adored fdr. >> i think you're right about that, absolutely. maybe i don't have one more. >> this was a wonderful talk. i have to be honest. i always thought that fdr embraced jefferson more than lincoln, did he connect the two at any point, i was looking fiercely for any speeches, but i felt like jefferson was more on the forefront than lincoln but maybe not. >> he was definitely important. so 1943, thank you.

so he did speak at the jefferson memorial. it is not as if she being overlooked. i'm trying to think of moments where it elevated at least for roosevelt and other people not just in the new deal administration, and when i think about popular culture, jefferson is not there. is it the big scene -- he is jefferson smith, but he has a big scene at the lincoln

memorial. so i think there was a time where he rose above jefferson for a moment. thank you. tonight we look back at presidents that faced crisis in the white house. they talk about james the war against mexico. enjoy american history on c-span three.

>> referee: the deepest cause with the true meaning of the revolution is the transformation that took place in the minds of the american people. >> we're going to talk about the tools and techniques of slave owner power and the power that was practiced by enslaved people. >> watch history professors lead discussions with their students on topics from the american revolution to september 11th. lectures in history on c span 3 and lectures in history is available as a podcast. find it where you listen to pod casts.